Iloilo will be host to a new BPO firm
Posted on September 19th, 2009
Iloilo is all set to take its place among the top new wave of international business process outsourcing (BPO) sites as it prepares to be host to Europe’s largest BPO firm – Transcom.
Transcom, who has 75 sites in 29 countries worldwide, will open a call center in Iloilo this year and is looking to hire from 1,000 to 2,000 employees.
Iloilo City Mayor Jerry Treñas said the company is set to start the hiring of around 1,060 employees this October, and it plans to double its work force after it starts its operations. He added that Transcom investment will give a boost to the city’s employment problems as it offers opportunities for residents of Iloilo as well as the rest of Western Visayas.
Transcom’s expertise is on various industries including telecommunications, the financial industry, travel and leisure, utilities and retail/consumer goods. It employs around 20,000 workers serving over 120 major clients in more than 30 languages.
Currently, Iloilo is already host to nine other BPOs with more than 4,000 workers. These are Eversun Software Philippines Corp., Savant Technologies, ePLDT Ventus, Teletech, Callbox Customer Contact Center, Global Mega Communications Inc., Techno Call Corp., Interactive Voice Call Center, and Medlink Trans Services.
Iloilo City was cited recently by the Business Process Association of the Philippines (BPAP) as the third in the top 10 “next wave cities†for business process outsourcing and information technology because the city provides low cost of doing business and the availability of talents.
The BusinessWeek, on the other hand, tagged Iloilo along with Davao earlier this year, as among the 31 cities being eyed by BPO investors due to economic and political pressures to outsource work to lower-cost cities.
The magazine report was based on the study made by the KPMG, a global network of professional services firms.
Based on the KPMG report, the two Philippine cites were rapidly emerging to compete with traditional BPO destinations, such as Bangalore, Chennai and Shanghai. It also said that Iloilo had a large talent pool because of the number of education institution and strong English skills of the population.
